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Help Stop the Assault on Salmon!

NOAA and NMFS targets of unprecedented attack on environmental safeguards

By CSPA’s Conservation Director John Beuttler

July 16, 2009 --The Southern Central Valley Ag Lobby has unleashed an unprecedented assault on Central Valley salmon, barely clinging to existence, that are to be protected under the Endangered Species Act. They are applying intense political pressure on multiple governmental targets to compel the National Marine Fishery Service (NMFS) to change their Biological Opinion on Sacramento River winter-run salmon so they can obtain increased water diversions from the Delta.
 
A few months ago a federal district court ordered NMFS to rectify the political rewriting of their previous biological opinion that had been altered to permit increased water diversions from the delta under the direction of the Bush Administration. The court found this illegal and instructed NMFS to revise the opinion to ensure the operation of state and federal water projects would no longer put the continued existence of this run of salmon in jeopardy of extinction. 
 
To the Service’s credit they did just that, only to find themselves under siege from California’s corporate agriculture sector. Their first overt effort came from Valley democratic Congressman Devin Nunes. He made a number of unsubstantiated claims on the floor of the House of Representatives in a nearly successful bid to remove funding from NMFS budget that would have prevented them from implementing this biological opinion.
 
Reliable information from Washington DC has advised that renewed attacks aimed at Congress and key federal agencies are underway to compel amending the opinion so more water can be exported out of the Delta to these corporate growers.
 
We find this to be absolutely reprehensible behavior as the NMFS Biological Opinion is based on the best science available. The science used in the opinion was peer reviewed by two different teams of scientists and found to valid. But these agricultural interests don’t care about the validity of the science and the need to protect the salmon, they just want a political solutions to get the ESA and the biological opinion out of their way.  
 
They would also like to get salmon out of their way, as well as other fish that swim in or through the Delta. These are the same folks who tried earlier this year to eradicate the striped bass fishery, but failed when anglers raised their voice in protest! They are the growers who so arrogantly say “it comes down to fish verse people”, as if fishing isn’t about people, our natural heritage birth right, food, and as if the sport and commercial fishing industries don’t make significant contributions of billions of dollars annually to our state’s economy. 

The fish need your help. We will be posting a list of things you can do to support NOAA and the NMFS's Salmon BiOP shortly. Taking positive action is the only way we know to turn around the lobbying impact of a few politically powerful corporations who want to profit from our loss. Please help us make our voice heard loud and clear! We need hundreds of letters, faxes, and phone calls to our congressional representatives telling them that this biological opinion is essential if we are to restore salmon in the Central Valley.
 
Please be ready to do your part when we advise on the methods in which you can help.